One for the ages for outdoorsmen

Growing old isn’t getting any easier. Or is it? Two official actions in recent weeks have created an accordion effect on the wallets of Colorado senior outdoosmen–one good, one less so.

The good, orchestrated by the Colorado Wildlife Commission, grants those who hold senior fishing licenses an automatic exception from the fee normally paid for a preference point for a limited big game license. This represents a savings of $25, the fee charged for a preference point in an attempt to keep manipulators, usually nonresidents, from abusing the system. Nice as it sounds, this applies to only a limited number of people, since a small percentage of seniors hunt big game.

The flip side, the part where it costs, doesn’t amount to nearly as much money, but it involves a lot more people. Someone with a sharp pencil checking the statute regarding who pays those nagging surcharges for search and rescue, 25 cents, and the PEAC education initiative, 75 cents, discovered that senior fishermen weren’t paying their share.

This means that instead of getting that angling tag absolutely for free, seniors henceforth will have to come up with a dollar. A buck isn’t a lot of money, even in a tough economy. But many sportsmen, whatever their ages, don’t much like how that money is spent. With that 25 cents, license buyers pay the great bulk of statewide search and rescue costs. Most of those tourists, hikers, climbers, rafters and kayakers–those who require most of the rescuing–pay nothing at all.

As we said, it’s only a buck, and what’s fair for seniors should be fair for everyone else. But when it comes to the rescue assessment, nothing seems fair for those who buy licenses to hunt and fish.